The Fresh Loaf

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Adjusting recipe for whole grains

DSM's picture
DSM

Adjusting recipe for whole grains

Hi,

I'm planning on adjusting Forkish's "overnight country brown" natural levain recipe with the addition of whole grains (sunflower seeds, oats, flaxseed).

How would you recommend I go about adjusting the flour/levain/water quantities in the current recipe? My two lines of thinking are to subtract the ww flour in an amount equal to the amount of whole grains I put in. For example, if I add 100 g of whole grains, subtract 100 g ww flour and keep everything else the same. My concern here is that whole grains don't function like milled flour, so things could get out of whack really fast.

My second thought, and what I'm leaning towards,  is keep the recipe more or less unchanged, and add the whole grains in addition to the flour. What I'm uncertain about with this is if I should adjust the water at all. I will soak the grains ahead of time, but I'm not sure if I should subtract this soaking water amount from the water added, or if the extra grains require the extra water.

Lastly, since the additional grains might provide some added nutritional benefit, do you think there's any need to decrease the amount of levain used since the yeast might be more active?

Thanks!

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

and can be toasted and pet in the nix whole.  if you soak the oats and flax in water for a couple of hours just drain them of and then squeeze out any excess liquid.  Then in they go.  i always grind or at least crack flax seeds in my coffee grinder since, even if soaked they will just pass though the human body pretty much undigested and the nutrition is lost.

 Don't deduct the WW since it is a whole grain nd you want that in the mix.

Happy baking the Forkish way - except for his levain builds.  Just build enough for your bake instead.

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

will keep the loaf from rising too high so the volume should be about the same to an unchanged loaf.  

I second soaking the seeds and draining well and not changing the recipe.  :)

Roast oats and sunflower seeds in butter before soaking.

lepainSamidien's picture
lepainSamidien

When I add large-ish bits like sunflower seeds, olives, walnuts, sesame seeds, etc., I typically will just throw them in at the end of kneading (or after 4 or 5 sets of stretch and folds, depending on the dough). Then just mix them in -- the dough will fall apart and tear like mad at first but will eventually find its way back to organization. I would keep your base dough formula the same.

Let us know how it goes !